Textured Tube Tips

I have received a lot of positive feedback on the tutorials I've written and I'm always happy to answer any questions.  I've had some people ask if they can sell the beads or buttons they make using my tutorials and my answer is a definite "yes".  When you purchase any of my tutorials, you are free to make what I teach and sell it wherever you like.

I want to share with you a few new tips on making the textured tube beads from my tutorial.  Some people prefer not to have as large a hole in their bead and I explain in step 4 on page 3 how to prevent this.  Softer clays like Premo or Fimo tend to make a larger hole so if that is the case, then I recommend allowing your beads to rest for a few hours to firm up before texturing them.

The large holes are nice if you want to string them on thicker cords but if you want to string your beads on a thinner wire, you can "fill" in the hole at each end with some attached clay rondelles or embed some beads into each end before baking.

  

Here are a couple of examples showing finished pieces with metal and glass seed beads embedded into the end of each tube.

I've been experimenting with some new textures and if you find that a texture sheet is too flimsy, then try making a reverse texture plate from clay.  I had this scrap piece of fabric that was not going to work so I used the Sculpey Bake & Bend to create a texture sheet from it.  You can see my previous blog post on how to do this.   I am now able to use the texture sheet to create my tube beads.

I will show you my finished beads and more on this later...